Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Another three quicker hits this evening on some matters touched on previously.

Sudbury Catholic board closes schoolsThe Star posted this late story (note the link may expire when the print version of the story is fed to the website overnight) Tuesday on the board decision to close a Corpus Christi. The reporting fairly conveyed the events of the meeting, including the parents' reaction. Will they all march out and enroll in the public board? This is a threat I hear uttered often in public meetings, one that is just as often never acted upon.

The decision was upsetting for several Corpus Christi parents, who staged an 11th hour fight to keep the Robinson Drive school open.

If that's the case, perhaps the 'battle' should have started earlier.

NDSS updatesThe attempt to give Niagara District Secondary School in Niagara-on-the-Lake a year's reprieve on an innovative attempt to allow time for enrolment to grow was shot down Tuesday night, according to this Standard story (again, note the caveat above).

Niagara District’s future has been in question for at least a decade as its enrolment continues to dwindle.The board has already decided to shut down the school by the end of the next school year, if its enrolment isn’t at least 350 students. Current enrolment is about 100 shy of that mark.

When the vote failed, area trustee Gary Atamanyk and colleague Lynn Campbell notified their peers they had a couple more attempts up their sleeves. Campbell's five-year reprieve is ridiculous, and only spares the school's current students from the consequences of the decisions that led enrolment to where it is today. Atamanyk's however, has promise-- particularly since the board's open-busing rules are a big part of why most of the 700 high school-aged students don't attend NDSS.

St. Catharines Catholic school stays open with uncertain futureIt was a busy night in St. Catharines for school accommodation in the Niagara Region. The Standard has this story on the fate of St. Nicholas in the city's core. Here's the best part of the article:

The 152-year-old school is battling declining enrolment, expected to drop from 145 to 100 students in the next decade, and needs $3.1 million in building upgrades. But it’s in an area that both city officials and school advocates say is en route to growth and renewal with the advent of new housing developments and plans for a new performing arts centre.

Those are a lot of challenges to overcome in three years. Remember "en route to growth and renewal" and a "performing arts centre" do not mean SFA when it comes to increasing school-aged population in the numbers needed to make a difference. Interesting to see another different solution come out of a Niagara school board however-- and to see whether the Niagara Catholic District School Board finds itself in the same quandary as its public cousin does with NDSS.